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Damn thinks... so many, and I haven't been able to write about all of them, and now I don't know where to start.
Work: I spent the last two days teaching Python to a selection of incoming freshmen, mostly with genders and skin colors that are underrepresented in tech. This is part of a program where we teach them how to make web apps and then we let them do it for real, in groups of three... and for the last few years I have been teaching them front-end stuff (HTML, CSS, Javascript) but this year I moved to the back-end code. Why? Because last year I taught front-end along with another female teacher. For no particular reason, the back-end Python and AppEngine bits were taught by men, and in every single group last year the young women did front-end work and the young men did back-end. It was striking and -- when we realized they were mirroring what they'd seen in their teachers -- kind of horrifying. So this year we had the men teach front-end. I co-taught Python, and enjoyed it; and my co-teacher from last year will co-teach AppEngine, this coming week. Looking forward to seeing how they ultimately split their work up.
I now have a ton of my regular work to catch up on, and I missed some workouts while this was happening, and was so tired I fell asleep right after dinner last night. No community service goes unpunished.
Family: my mother is in the midwest right now, moving my grandfather to assisted living. Seems reasonable enough that, six months after my grandmother died, he'd be about done with living unassisted in that giant old house they shared. He seems to be going about 50% willingly. My mother talks about him sometimes as if he is a child ("Dad stayed on task very well today, sorting through clothing...") and sometimes as if he is a fearsome person with actual authority over her. She's overwhelmed herself, of course, doing much of the physical work of packing up the things in that house and trying to get some of it appraised/sold. Eventually the house itself will go.
Work: I spent the last two days teaching Python to a selection of incoming freshmen, mostly with genders and skin colors that are underrepresented in tech. This is part of a program where we teach them how to make web apps and then we let them do it for real, in groups of three... and for the last few years I have been teaching them front-end stuff (HTML, CSS, Javascript) but this year I moved to the back-end code. Why? Because last year I taught front-end along with another female teacher. For no particular reason, the back-end Python and AppEngine bits were taught by men, and in every single group last year the young women did front-end work and the young men did back-end. It was striking and -- when we realized they were mirroring what they'd seen in their teachers -- kind of horrifying. So this year we had the men teach front-end. I co-taught Python, and enjoyed it; and my co-teacher from last year will co-teach AppEngine, this coming week. Looking forward to seeing how they ultimately split their work up.
I now have a ton of my regular work to catch up on, and I missed some workouts while this was happening, and was so tired I fell asleep right after dinner last night. No community service goes unpunished.
Family: my mother is in the midwest right now, moving my grandfather to assisted living. Seems reasonable enough that, six months after my grandmother died, he'd be about done with living unassisted in that giant old house they shared. He seems to be going about 50% willingly. My mother talks about him sometimes as if he is a child ("Dad stayed on task very well today, sorting through clothing...") and sometimes as if he is a fearsome person with actual authority over her. She's overwhelmed herself, of course, doing much of the physical work of packing up the things in that house and trying to get some of it appraised/sold. Eventually the house itself will go.
